A Flight from Chile to Panama: Aeronautical Mobile Contact with KX4WC/AM, with VK3MO in the Group

WA3O sent me an e-mail alerting me to the fact that Mike KX4WC/Aeronautical Mobile would be flying up from Santiago, Chile to Panama City this morning. So I fired up the 20 meter rig and hoped for the best.

Not only was I able to talk to Mike, I was also able to work WA3O, VY2WW, and VK3MO in Melbourne. It was a very FB morning. VK3MO was really booming in. I have worked Ian before -- his 5 over 5 over 5 over 5 array on 20 meters really helps. https://www.qrz.com/db/VK3MO

I was not hearing Mike KX4WC very well until the sun came up over our north-south path. You can see this in the picture below. Thanks to all for this very cool contact.

Ian VK3MO's 20 meter array

Peter VK3TPM had done a very nice profile of Ian and his station: 

https://www.mrarc.org.au/member-profile-ian-vk3mo/

The HBR-13C Receiver and the Poetic License of Homebrewers

I've been hanging out on 17 meters with my homebrew VXO-controlled BITX transceiver.  The antenna is my 75 meter doublet fed with window line through a homebrew tuner made from dead ( I swear) DX-40s and DX-60s. I can tune it up just fine on 17 meters, but I realize I probably have lots of nulls and lobes in the radiation pattern.  Apparently one of the lobes is over my old stomping grounds in Panama.  Almost everyday I talk to either HP9SAM or HP3SS. 

Robby, HP3SS, is using SDR gear now, but he was a real homebrewer back in the day.  Years ago he built an HBR-13C receiver. That's quite an achievement. 

Robby -- formerly VY2SS -- told me that he sold his HBR-13C to none other than Joe Walsh, the rockstar from The Eagles.  FB. 

As I was talking to Robby yesterday, I came across this wonderful web page about the receiver: 

https://sparcradio.ca/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Restoring-a-HBR-13-Amateur-Receiver.pdf

Robby told me that his receiver looked almost exactly like the one on the SPARC site, but he didn't recognize the small box with what looked like a speaker on the chassis.  I told him that my guess was that this was a crystal calibrator in an oven. 

I also told Robby that I feel an affinity with the HBR project, not just because I like homebrew superhets, but also because my call in the UK was M0HBR.  

There are some great quotes in the SPARC pdf: 

The SPARC page led me to the amazing website of Kees K5BCQ: 

https://www.qsl.net/k5bcq/HBR/hbr.html

Here is Kees's QRZ page: 

https://www.qsl.net/k5bcq/